Vehicle parking lots are well known having designated spaces defined by curb stones and/or lines on the parking surface. Access to the parking lot is normally controlled by a gate operated by mechanical dispensing of a ticket for parking or insertion of a coded card into the gate controller. Access to in indoor parking lots is normally controlled by a garage door operated either by a key, a coded card or a remote transmitter carried by or operated by those authorized to use the parking area. None of this however provides control of access to individual parking spaces within the parking lot or different designated parking areas of that lot.
There have been a number of prior proposals of user operated parking space barriers as exemplified by the teachings of the following U.S. Pat. Nos: 3,673,734 issued Jul. 4, 1972; 3,698,135 issued Oct. 17, 1972; 3,849,936 issued Nov. 26, 1974; 3,968,596 issued Jul. 13, 1976; 3,061,960 issued Nov. 6, 1962; 3,688,439 issued Sept. 5, 1972; 4,713,910 issued Dec. 22, 1987; 4,762,439 issued Aug. 9, 1988; 4,641,459 issued Feb. 10, 1987; 3,913,264 issued Oct. 21, 1975; 2,657,486 issued Nov. 3, 1953; 4,062,149 issued Dec. 13, 1977; and 4,457,105 issued Jul. 3, 1984.
A shortcoming common to the foregoing proposals is that they are complicated and expensive devices and/or not suitable for both indoor and outdoor use and particularly in outdoor use where during part of the year they are subjected to heavy snow and icing conditions and freezing and thawing conditions.